840 launched their second season with a concert of cello music performed by Tre Voci (www.trevocicelloensemble.com).

http://eightforty.co.uk/events/121015/

The programme featured new music from two renowned experimental composers based abroad – Luiz Henrique Yudo (Netherlands) and Sergei Zagny (Russia) – alongside new works by UK-based composers Timothy Cape, Eleanor Cully, Alex Nikiporenko and Nicholas Peters. The programme was completed by Duo for two cellos by Richard Glover. 

Formed in 2012, Tre Voci is made up of Norwegian cellist Torun Saeter Stavseng and British cellists/composers Gregor Riddell and Colin Alexander. Tre Voci's repertoire ranges from transcriptions of medieval and renaissance vocal music to contemporary commissions including the use of electronics and improvisation.

This concert was kindly supported by Arts Council England.

The concert took place	 on Monday the 12th of October 2015 at St James’ Church, Islington.

840: New Music for Cellos

840 presented a programme of new music for violin and piano, performed by violinist Ruben Zilberstein and pianist Mateusz Rettner (Explore Ensemble).

Linda Catlin Smith’s piece from 1997, ’With Their Shadows Long’, provided the natural starting point for the creation of the programme with its preoccupation with the physicality of sound, and a care and natural intuition for a sense of rightness in placement and form.

The rest of the programme consisted entirely of brand-new pieces by Matteo Fargion, Georgia Rodgers, James Luff and Alex Nikiporenko, all written especially for this concert.

An exciting first for 840 is the music of Matteo Fargion. Matteo is a composer perhaps best known for his close associations with the world of dance, in particular his decades-long collaboration with Jonathan Burrows, creating and touring a series of duets which have become celebrated all over the world for their rare combination of intellectual rigour and humour.

The concert was kindly supported using public funding by Arts Council England.

http://eightforty.co.uk/events/161217/

840: New Music for Violin and Piano

840 presented an evening of new music for viola and cello, performed by Jennifer Ames Alexander and Colin Alexander (Tre Voci). Showcasing the versatility of this duet, the programme featured intimate, resonant pieces from Eva-Maria Houben (Wandelweiser) and Marc Sabat alongside brand-new works from Colin Alexander, James Luff and Alex Nikiporenko.

The concert also featured works by two wonderful Irish composers, with a piece from Amanda Feery in which disjointed fragments replace seamless transitions, and a newly-composed work from Garrett Sholdice (Ergodos), known for writing music of ‘exquisite delicacy’ (The Irish Times).

http://eightforty.co.uk/events/070718/

840: New Music for Viola and Cello

For this programme, 840 has collaborated with with the cellist and inter-disciplinary artist Anton Lukoszevieze. Anton has had a distinguished career, commissioning and performing a huge range of experimental, avant-garde and improvised music, both as a soloist and as the founder of the group Apartment House.

Anton performed new works for solo cello by Christian Wolff, Darya Zvezdina, James Luff and Michael Winter, as well as Laurence Crane’s gem from 1985 "Five Preludes" for cello and piano. The programme also featured recent music by Alex Nikiporenko, Anton’s own "What we really want to do is serve happiness" and Linda Catlin Smith’s beguiling "Ricercar".

Anton Lukoszevieze was joined by Alex Nikiporenko on the piano.

The concert took place on 21 September 2018 at St James' Church, Islington.

http://eightforty.co.uk/events/210918/

840: New Music for Cello and Piano

840: New Music for Clarinet, Violin and Piano featured Eos Ensemble performing music by Eva-Maria Houben, Makiko Nishikaze, Tim Parkinson and the Armenian priest Komitas, alongside new pieces by Paul Evernden, James Luff and Alex Nikiporenko.

If there is something that unites the composers featured in our concert, it is an attitude of presenting sounds as sounds, directly and unadorned. Each piece embodies the practice of a unique creative artist, communicating a strong and clear sense of identity without reference to anything extra-musical.

Music of sparse and delicate intensity from Eva-Maria Houben and Makiko Nishikaze, drawing attention to the details of sounds in idiosyncratic ways, featured alongside the elegant, Armenian folk-influenced pieces by Komitas, and the unique experimentalism of Tim Parkinson. The concert also presented new works that explore the reduction of a romantic waltz idiom to a rigid construct, the tension between repetitive parts and an ever-changing whole (and vice versa), as well as the versatility of the bass clarinet.

Eos Ensemble are: Paul Evernden, Angela Najaryan and Thomas Ang.

http://eightforty.co.uk/events/220219/

840: New Music for Clarinet, Violin and Piano

neither serious/or, I take the liberty/of not writing to you/regarding my serious 'Variations' is a piece about unformed relationships between people and scores. A string quartet sight-reads unfamiliar material on stage, under a time pressure situation where they do not have enough time to rehearse and play the piece adequately (continuing a series of works I have written exploring this idea). The material is based on a piece they know already (Beethoven Op. 18 No. 2), giving the unfamiliar score a sense of false familiarity.

www.louisdheudieres.com

Louis D'Heudieres - neither serious/...

Found on Film explores a variety of gradual processes whereby the players change their tempo, dynamics or timbre independently. Different relationships between the parts are explored as material is passed around the ensemble from one block to another. 

Found on Film was written for the Fidelio Trio as part of the Cheltenham Music Festival Composers Academy 2014 and is dedicated to Louisa Smyllie. 

www.nicholasrpeters.com

Nicholas Peters - Found On Film

Rotherham explores diaphragm accents (no tongue) and the impact that this can have on the sounds produced using renaissance recorders. This imbalance is a focal point throughout. This piece was written between April and June 2015 for Block4.

www.nicholasrpeters.com

Rotherham was written for BLOCK4 (www.block4.co.uk) and first performed by them in 840: New Music for Recorders on the 13th of July 2015 in St James' Islington. The concert was recorded by Lawrence Dunn.

Nicholas Peters – Rotherham

Modus Triplex explores the rich, resonant sonorities that are available on three cellos, especially when playing multiple strings at once. Three pairs of strings that can be double stopped (CG, GD and DA) and the three cellos in Tre Voci meant that number 3 was a natural starting point for a simple number row (111223), from which the entire piece was constructed. 

Modus Triplex has been released on Nonclassical's 'Outside the Lines' EP 
 https://open.spotify.com/user/nonclassical/playlist/7bw0IuUACL7vS0Vc38ziES

Modus Triplex was written for Tre Voci and premiered at the 840: New Music for Cellos on 12/10/2015.

Modus Triplex

tutto dietro il ponticello /everything behind the bridge began as a piece for solo violin in early 2014. Following the opportunity to write for Tre Voci, I adapted the piece for three cellos and recently completed it. The piece exists behind the bridge of each cello throughout, with the wood of each bow mostly located in the central area between the bridge and the tailpiece. 

www.eleanorcully.co.uk

tutto dietro il ponticello was written for Tre Voci (www.trevocicelloensemble.com) and premièred by them at the 840: New Music for Cellos on 12/10/2015.

Eleanor Cully - tutto dietro il ponticello

Paul Klee's painting of the same name (1932) was the inspiration for this piece through its use of transparency and dots.

www.soundcloud.com/luiz-henri

CLARIFICATION was written for Tre Voci (www.trevocicelloensemble.com) and premièred by them at the 840: New Music for Cellos on 12/10/2015.

Luiz Henrique Yudo - CLARIFICATION

Drangway(s) uses material from a previous piece that I wrote for solo cello in 2009/10, called Drangway, for Anton Lukoszevieze. This version for three cellos is a fractured reconstruction of the original. It uses a process similar to gluing a broken pot back together where some parts appear as the original and some take on a new form. 

www.nicholasrpeters.com

Drangway(s) was written for Tre Voci (www.trevocicelloensemble.com) and premièred by them at the 840: New Music for Cellos on 12/10/2015.

Nicholas Peters - Drangway(s)

A big part of what I try to do as a composer is to help focus listening towards very simple materials, usually pitches and pitch relationships. This piece uses gradual transformation to highlight the pitch relationships involved in a perfect cadence (a tool found commonly in some musics) and various other artefacts which arise from the process of sounding out this transformation. 

www.richardglover.wordpress.com

Duo for two cellos was written for Tre Voci (www.trevocicelloensemble.com) and performed by them at the 840: New Music for Cellos on 12/10/2015.

Richard Glover - Duo for two cellos

NEED looks at the effect that advertising has on our lives, on how we present ourselves in social and professional contexts, and on our clarity to make conscientious decisions which are true to our values. 

www.timothycape.wordpress.com

NEED was written for Tre Voci (www.trevocicelloensemble.com) and premièred by them at the 840: New Music for Cellos on 12/10/2015.

Timothy Cape - NEED

“Scacciapensieri” is one of the many Italian words for “Mouth Harp” or “Jew's Harp”. “Scacciare” means “chasing away” and “pensieri” can be translated as “thoughts”. The reason for this name is because the Mouth-Harp is placed on the teeth and uses the mouth but also the full skull resonance, because of its placement on the teeth. Since the full skull resonates, one says that all thoughts will be chased away. The melody in my piece comes from a very popular Italian song: Eh, cumpari. The song describes a list of instruments and asks how they sound. The percussionists tonight will be chasing their own list of percussion instruments away.

www.maya.ricercata.org

Scacciare Pensieri was written for Abstruckt Ensemble and premiered at the 840: New Music for Percussion on 01/06/2016.

Maya Verlaak – Scacciare Pensieri

When Alex Nikiporenko asked for a piano trio in late 2014 for an 840 concert, the piece that emerged included a paraphrase of Auld Lang Syne. In the process of writing (and fiddling with anthems etc.) I ended up making a harmonisation of the Star-Spangled Banner. Thinking about what to contribute to another 840 concert (spring 2017) the harmonisation felt somehow apt. This present arrangement casts it for string quartet.

www.lawrencedunn.co.uk

This arrangement of "The Star-Spangled Banner" was written for the Manon Quartet and premiered at the 840: New Music for String Quartet on 06/05/2017.

John Stafford Smith, arr. Lawrence Dunn –  The Star-Spangled Banner

This piece uses the acoustic characteristics of a real space as its basis. The impulse response of St. Andrew's church was analysed to reveal its room modes—those frequencies which it best supports. The strongest nine frequencies were extracted, along with the corresponding twelve tone equally tempered pitches and deviations in cents. The frequencies are approximated in various ways by the violin and piano, creating an abstracted (or extracted?) version of the sonic space.

St Andrew's church in Rutland is known for its 'acoustic jars' dating from the 15th century which are set into the chancel walls. These features were supposedly meant to help amplify the voice of the priest, but there is some doubt as to whether they would have worked or not.

polarpatterns.wordpress.com

"St. Andrew’s Lyddington" was written for Ruben Zilberstein and Mateusz Rettner and premiered by them in 840: New Music for Violin and Piano on the 16 December 2017 at St James' Islington.

Georgia Rodgers – St. Andrew’s Lyddington

"'With Their Shadows Long' was composed in 1997 at the request of the Sabat/Clarke duo. I think of this work as a melody that is often ornamented by the presence of other notes or chords. I conceived of the two instruments as equal but different elements of the same line, two entities traveling the same path, occasionally casting shadows. There are points in the piece where the shadows get very long—the piece thins out to almost nothing."

"With Their Shadows Long" was performed by Ruben Zilberstein and Mateusz Rettner in 840: New Music for Violin and Piano on the 16 December 2017 at St James' Islington.

Linda Catlin Smith – With Their Shadows Long

"I wrote this at the request of James Luff who curated this concert. It’s the first piece of ‘concert’ music I’ve attempted for ages. I worked with the image of the two performers playing through half-forgotten tunes, in a tricky negotiation with the disembodied voice calling out possible titles, irrespective of whether they’re ready to move on or not."

"Violin & Piano Music" was written for Ruben Zilberstein and Mateusz Rettner and premiered by them in 840: New Music for Violin and Piano on the 16 December 2017 at St James' Islington.

Matteo Fargion – Violin & Piano Music

“Didn’t Even Try” is a semi-automatic reimagining of the 2014 post-R&B song “Without You” by Spooky Black, a teenager from Minnesota. INDIE Magazine writes about his music: “...it’s this beautifully dark world, the feeling of social isolation and acoustic depression that his songs bring with them. Because music makes most sense when you’re sad.” It is never clear whether Spooky’s sadness is genuine or ironic, or perhaps a mixture of the two. 

My piece attempts to translate this aesthetic into the context of a 21st-century contemporary classical piece for violin and piano. The violin’s simple, quiet melody is a lost, lone voice, whilst the piano is unsettled and fleeting, half-mimicking the violin in an unresolved, indecisive manner.

“Didn’t Even Try” was written for Ruben Zilberstein and Mateusz Rettner and premiered by them at 840: New Music for Violin and Piano on 7 April 2018.

Didn't Even Try

"Plainsound Duet was written in 2018. A companion piece to my earlier duo Gioseffo Zarlino, it similarly explores two possible melodic modes which divide the major third into wholetones, one larger (9/8) and one smaller (10/9). In this case, the counterpoint invites the middle note to continually change its tuning by a syntonic comma, sometimes higher, sometimes lower, by following a path suggested by simple consonances."

http://www.marcsabat.com

"Plainsound Duet" was premiered by Jennifer Ames Alexander and Colin Alexander at 840: New Music for Viola and Cello on the 7 July 2018 at St James' Islington.

Marc Sabat - Plainsound Duet

"Claudius Ptolemy was written in 2008 for Johnny Chang and Jessica Catron. Tempo is free: as swiftly as accurate intonation permits, but taking time whenever necessary. Each pitch may be held whenever needed to clearly focus the sounds. For the most part, overlapping tones produce ‘tuneable intervals’, which may be precisely realised by ear.

There are only seven pitch classes used in this piece, forming a scale tuned according to the tetrachord of Claudius Ptolemy’s tense diatonic mode. This ancient scale is one of the earliest expressions of a tuning system called 5-limit just intonation, in which pitches are related by simple frequency ratios of primes 2, 3 and 5 only. The music systematically explores the melodic and harmonic intervals of this scale, each in turn."

www.marcsabat.com

"Claudius Ptolemy" was performed by Jennifer Ames Alexander and Colin Alexander at 840: New Music for Viola and Cello on the 7 July 2018 at St James' Islington.

Marc Sabat - Claudius Ptolemy

Performed by Jenny Ames Alexander and Colin Alexander at 840: New Music for Viola & Cello on 7/7/18

duet (viola & cello, 2018)

"This piece is a result of a significant change in my work routine, which has gone from having an expanse of time in front of me to work on a piece; enough time to walk into walls, stare into space, and toy around with a compositional idea, to these very short, high intensity bursts of writing. The piece is made up of small blocks of disjointed musical material, composed weeks apart during a stolen hour here and there. Parts in the piece square up to each other rather than move seamlessly through time."

amandafeery.com

"Square Movement" was performed by Jennifer Ames Alexander and Colin Alexander at 840: New Music for Viola and Cello on the 7 July 2018 at St James' Islington.

Amanda Feery – Square Movement

JI is a duet of reflections and connections embracing the warm sound world of these two instruments.

trevocicelloensemble.com/colin-alexander

"JI" was premiered by Jennifer Ames Alexander and Colin Alexander at 840: New Music for Viola and Cello on the 7 July 2018 at St James' Islington.

Colin Alexander – JI

"'à l’unisson X' for 2-6 strings is one piece within the series à l’unisson, all realising different kinds of performing in unison. 

Why a French title? I got many ideas listening to music of Hector Berlioz who loved the unison sound. It’s a sound that often opens a great space of amazing colours and overtones.

All performers play the same pitches (nearly) together, and the resulting sound may be different from and greater than the sum of the individual sounds."

evamariahouben.de

'à l’unisson X' was performed by Jennifer Ames Alexander and Colin Alexander at 840: New Music for Viola and Cello on the 7 July 2018 at St James' Islington.

Eva-Maria Houben – à l’unisson X

"Gymel" is a term associated with two-part counterpoint in Medieval and Renaissance vocal music, especially in England. In particular, it often refers to the "dividing" of one part into two parts. The piece is dedicated to James Luff, Molly Maitland, and Joseph Apollo Maitland.

garrettsholdice.ie

"Gymel" was premiered by Jennifer Ames Alexander and Colin Alexander at 840: New Music for Viola and Cello on the 7 July 2018 at St James' Islington.

Garrett Sholdice – Gymel

Written for and performed by Anton Lukoszevieze at 840 New Music for Cello and Piano, St. James Islington, 21.9.18 - http://eightforty.co.uk/events/210918/

line (solo cello, 2018)

"Raimondas Rumsas" was commissioned for Anton Lukoszevieze by the Ultima Festival in Oslo and first performed at the 2002 festival. Earlier that year Anton purchased a curved bow, which allows him to play 3 or 4 strings at once. He set about commissioning composers to write new works to be played with a curved bow. I worked closely with him to learn what was possible to do with the bow; we worked in his studio, which at that time was an old railway signal box parked in his garden. The piece lasts nearly six minutes and has been recorded by both Anton (on Another Timbre) and Oliver Coates (on Prah Recordings).

https://soundcloud.com/laurence-crane

"Raimondas Rumsas" was performed by Anton Lukoszevieze at 840: New Music for Cello and Piano on the 21 September 2018 at St James' Islington.

Laurence Crane - Raimondas Rumsas

Written for Mark Knoop, in memory of Michael Harrison.

The title is taken from a text written by the artist Agnes Martin, which is basically a series of Taoist musings on what is important in life. The piano spells out each rhythmic iteration of the sentence, slowly and with a 'hidden' evolving harmonic system.

http://www.antonlukoszevieze.co.uk/

"What we really want to do is serve happiness" was performed by Alex Nikiporenko at 840: New Music for Cello and Piano on the 21 September 2018 at St James' Islington.

Anton Lukoszevieze - What we really want to do is serve happiness

"I love the sound of the Baroque cello, so I was very excited to write a piece for Elinor Frey, (commissioned by Daniel Cooper). I think of this piece as a melody in search of its harmony. The first part of the work explores a dance-like line; later the melody is lost into a place of utter spareness and stillness – almost like coming to terms with one’s innermost qualities – and later again there is the appearance of a melodic chain of rich chords. My thanks go to Elinor Frey for suggesting the title (the word “Ricercar” means “to search out”), and for her beautiful interpretation of my music."

http://www.catlinsmith.com/

"Ricercar" was performed by Anton Lukoszevieze at 840: New Music for Cello and Piano on the 21 September 2018 at St James' Islington.

Linda Catlin Smith - Ricercar

"These are dedicated to Anton Lukoszevieze, in friendship and admiration for his playing and organizing the first-rate performing of new work.

There are five pieces. In the first, second and fifth there are phrase sequences with free pauses between them. There are also notations for just dynamics (sounds free), and for just rhythms (free sounds). The third and fourth pieces are on grids of 6 x 6 and 8 x 8 bars, allowing continuities to be chosen in variously free ways."

"Small Pieces for Cellist" were premiered by Anton Lukoszevieze at 840: New Music for Cello and Piano on the 21 September 2018 at St James' Islington.

Christian Wolff - Small Pieces for Cellist

These short duos for violin and piano look back at the romantic waltz idiom, gradually reconstructing its vigorously spinning character from a stark, transparent opening.

Two Waltzes were written for Angela Najaryan and Thomas Ang and premiered by them at 840: New Music for Clarinet, Violin and Piano on 22 February 2019.

http://eightforty.co.uk/events/220219/

Two Waltzes: 2. Minore

Two Waltzes: 1. Maggiore

"clarinet violin and piano piece was written in 2008 for the New York Miniaturist Ensemble who only played works with 100 notes or less. It was first performed by them on 25th September at the W.M.P. Concert Hall, E28th St, New York City. The performers were Eric Carlson (violin), Joshua Rubin (clarinet), Philip Fisher (piano). 

The second performance was on 23rd February 2013 at Moments Musicaux in Aarau, Switzerland, by Angharad Davies (violin) Jürg Frey (clarinet) and me on piano. Exactly six years later (minus one day) this will be the third performance. It is a list of sound objects of different shapes, sizes and functionalities."

http://www.untitledwebsite.com/

clarinet violin and piano piece was performed by Paul Evernden, Angela Najaryan and Thomas Ang at 840: New Music for Clarinet, Violin and Piano on the 22 February 2019 at St James' Islington.

Tim Parkinson - clarinet, violin and piano piece

"What I am trying to do in my music is to create sounds which invite attentive listening. When I am composing, I imagine what the audience will anticipate and then compose something which is unpredictable – both in the major form and in the details."

http://www.makiko-nishikaze.de/

Duo was performed by Paul Evernden and Thomas Ang at 840: New Music for Clarinet, Violin and Piano on the 22 February 2019 at St James' Islington.

Makiko Nishikaze - Duo

"Being a threesome, a special commonality arises. Three participants share a room. It takes three to deliver a narration, as thespians may know. A third party is added, and the relationship between the two is disturbed. Something can happen. Thus, the trio addresses instability. The trio is a vulnerable body. Collisions, frictions, but also compensation and protection against danger become important in the trio. The three actors of a trio are radically dependent on each other. "avalon orchard" is a piece that knows this…"

http://www.evamariahouben.de/

"avalon orchard" was performed by Paul Evernden, Angela Najaryan and Thomas Ang at 840: New Music for Clarinet, Violin and Piano on the 22 February 2019 at St James' Islington.

Eva-Maria Houben - avalon orchard

(re)set for solo bass clarinet (2019)

This piece was written for 840 and the NME. It is composed from five combinations of pitches and rhythms, stitched together to make one unfolding form in which groups of notes are covered and uncovered in turn. This process of covering up sounds led me to thinking about the phenomenon of auditory masking, whereby the perception of one sound is altered by another which occurs simultaneously (or very soon before/after). Auditory masking can affect the nature of sounds we hear in various ways, particularly when those sounds are already closely related in pitch or timbre. 

polarpatterns.wordpress.com

Masking Set was performed by Sara Rodrigues (voice), Francesca Gilbert (viola) and Peteris Sokolovskis (cello) at 840: 840: Five Year Anniversary on the 31 January 2020 at Café OTO.

Georgia Rodgers — Masking Set

840 is a London-based concert series curated by composers Alex Nikiporenko and Christian Drew. The series is dedicated to providing a platform for new experimental and minimal music. Each concert focuses on a particular chamber instrumentation, showcasing a diversity of works by living composers. 

840 takes its name from Erik Satie's inscription in Vexations - "In order to play the theme 840 times in succession, it would be advisable to prepare oneself beforehand, and in the deepest silence, by serious immobilities." 

Composer Nicholas Peters co-founded and co-curated the series from 2014 until 2017. Composer James Luff co-curated the series from 2017 until 2020.

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